Postkiwi

I’ve just returned from a spiritual retreat for Uniting Church clergy at James Byrne Retreat Centre, near Toowoomba.

I was asked to come as worship leader - with the responsibility of leading the eucharist each day, each time with a different style. We worshipped in the chapel, outside, and at the tables in the dining room. The four styles revolved around song, pilgrimage, meal and poetry. The Scriptures for the week took us from last Sunday’s gospel reading in which two disciples encounter Jesus on the road to Emmaus, to this coming Sunday’s readings focusing on Jesus the shepherd.

Resources we used included A New Zealand Prayer Book, published by the (Anglican) Church of the Province of New Zealand/Te Haahi o te Porowini o Niu Tireni. We used three different prayers based on Psalm 23 from David Grant’s Grant Us Your Peace.

I’ve listed some of the thoughts of the week at my Gospel Notes blog.

Dawn Courtman was the retreat leader. At one point she was pastor at Windsor Rd Baptist Church in Brisbane. She now specialises in spiritual direction and is associated with Brookfield Centre for Christian Spirituality and The Stillpoint Centre.

On the first morning with Dawn we were invited to enter one of the paintings of Vincent Van Gogh, “First Steps”. Painted in the last year of his life, while he was still living at an assylum in Saint-Remy de Provence. The painting can be viewed online at the Vincent van Gogh Gallery.

In the painting a farmer has put down his spade to encourage the first steps of his child, supportingly held by the mother. We used the painting to explore our relationship with God - reflecting on our movement towards God and God’s movement towards us.

I certainly feel refreshed after the four days of focused retreat. There was time for silence and solitude, as well as relaxed camaraderie. There was no capacity for blogging, checking email or browsing on the net. My family warned me not to spend the whole week stressing out over worship. I guess there was a certain amount of hard work associated with being there - which I was sparing others. But I made sure there was time for my own personal reflection, sleep and recreation.